


A distant ship, smoke on the horizon

by crimsonepitaph



Series: Soldiers Verse [7]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Anxiety, Domestic Fluff, M/M, Repressed Memories, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:01:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23943580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crimsonepitaph/pseuds/crimsonepitaph
Summary: Jared and Jensen's life is slowly getting back to normal, but the quiet leaves space for buried things to come out.
Relationships: Jensen Ackles/Jared Padalecki
Series: Soldiers Verse [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/786189
Comments: 6
Kudos: 53





	A distant ship, smoke on the horizon

**Author's Note:**

> **Author's note #1:** A huge thank you to Betty for always reading through my writing before I let it out in the world, and giving me feedback!
> 
>  **Author's note #2:** Maintaining the tradition, the title is a lyric from Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb".

At breakfast, Padalecki shows up shirtless, low hanging jeans leaving the elastic band of his boxers in plain sight, a perfect treat to go with Jensen’s cereal this morning.

“That’s what you get for not doing laundry, ” Jensen comments, a tiny bit of saliva maybe dripping down his chin in between the spoonful of milk that missed the landing.

But, hey, muscles. Miles of tan skin, wide shoulders that can be studied in anatomy classes, the curve of Jared’s back, his ass as he reaches for an empty cup to pour his coffee.

“I have clothes,” Jared retorts somewhat absently, back turned to Jensen, preoccupied to get the coffee and milk proportions exactly how he likes it.

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s this heat,” Jared says, smiling while he sits down with his coffee across from Jensen. “Got out of the shower, didn’t know if I was still wet or already sweating.” Then, after a brief pause, “How are you feeling?”

Jensen skips the syrup-y _better, now that you’re here_ , partly because it has nothing to do with how much he loves Padalecki, and everything with how good his ass looks wrapped in dark blue denim.

“Fine. Almost no pain. ”

“That’s good. Meds?”

“Finished my prescription yesterday.”

Padalecki leans forward, crossing his arms, elbows on the table. He frowns. “You’re done with it?”

Jensen nods. He loathes the feeling of drugs in his system.

“You?” he asks Jared.

His partner nods, too, but it’s far from the decisive one Jensen had given. Eyes downcast, hand clenched around the mug, minute gesture. Necessary. But they’re not talking about this.

“Beaver?”

“Tomorrow,” Jensen answers. “You have the group thing today?”

“Sixteen hundred. Cortese’s going to be there, ” Jared replies, a tad more animated.

Jensen throws him a questioning look. Padalecki answers without further prompting.

“Morgan sent me the details last night. We have babysitters. People officially trained to deal with this shit. Apparently, we’re just the poster kids, literally. The draw in. ”

Jensen scrapes the last of his bland, high-fiber oat cereal off the margins of the bowl. “I doubt it’s like that. I mean, I get it, but - think, how many people will want to talk to Cortese? Or Beaver, for that matter? Hell, we wouldn’t want to in their situation. “

“And yet, we keep doing it,” Jared intervenes around a grin.

Jensen rolls his eyes.

“Point is, they’re there to make sure things don’t go off the rails…not babysitters. _Referees._ ”

“If you say so,” Padalecki concedes.

Easily. Without any more debate. Without an existential crisis.

He seems… _mellow_ this morning. Jensen doesn’t know if it’s the meds, or simply Jared, without the weight of the world hanging over him. 

“You’re not freaking out?”

Okay, could have been better put on Jensen’s part. But it’s merely a projection of the feelings he has about his own meeting later in the week.

“I’m not thinking about it.”

Ah, yes. Still Jared. Panic schedule: non-existent. Market full of insurgents shooting at him, or room of soldiers looking for understanding? Same thing, same modus operandi. Jumping in without looking, and that stupid trademark grin that makes you think bullets bounce off his skin. This is a mission, or at least Drill Sergeant Padalecki will treat it like it is.

“You have time before you go in?” Padalecki breaks Jensen out of his reverie, downing the last of his coffee.

Jensen answers mechanically. “Ten minutes.”

“It’s enough.”

“For what?” Jensen asks, confused, while he sits up, deposits his bowl and mug in the sink. He’s not prepared to find Padalecki behind him when he turns.

Close. Inches. Heat.

“I saw the way you were looking at me,” Padalecki tells Jensen, voice low, rough, almost whispered.

Jensen’s fingers go to the button on Jared’s jeans of their own accord, open it, pull down the zipper without thinking.

Yeah. He was looking.

And it’s not like they didn’t know they carried that civilized, productive conversation with Jensen’s hard on begging to be let out of his uniform pants. Insistently.

Padalecki’s sharp inhale, the way he moves towards Jensen instantly, the intensity in his eyes, dark and inviting, promising -

The taste of coffee.

Hands in his hair. Fingers on the back of his neck. Jensen’s hands moving from the zipper to Jared’s back, to his ass, the abrasive feel of just-washed denim.

Padalecki, dropping to his knees. Surgical precision in unbuttoning Jensen, putting his lips around Jensen's cock. Quick, dirty, enthusiastic. Jensen lets go. This is the only thing he feels. Wet heat. Pleasure. Building. One cracked moan from Jared at a time, one swallow around his cock, one look at Jared’s eyes, brimming with tears and blissful agony.

He comes, a _fuck_ drawn out, throat dry, words refusing to settle themselves against the moment, coming out in pieces, in trembles of his hands where Jensen grips the countertop. Padalecki gets up seconds after, crazed eyes, kissing a still shaking Jensen, rough, enormous hand cupping his jaw, turning it in the way Jared likes, maneuvering Jensen, moving against him without rhythm. A short, muted scream, a spasm that rocks Jared against him, Jared’s right palm coming to his neck, holding, head dropping to Jensen’s right shoulder.

Breaths. Quick, irregular. Padalecki’s mouth near his ear.

Both too sensitive to be this close, to have the material of their clothes rubbing against their still dripping cocks. But this is why it feels so good.

Neither of them will give up until there’s too much. Truly. When it does real damage.

The pain - this one - is the best part of it.

~

The good start to the day transitions into an easy day at the office. Well, _easy_ in the sense there’s only one or two life and death decisions Jensen has to make for teams out in the field.

It ends in bed, with a book in his hands.

It’s a way to deal with insomnia. Jared goes for a run, or bloodies his knuckles on the boxing bag they have in their home gym. Jensen reads.

Usually, Jared says he’s lulled to sleep by the rustle of the pages and Jensen’s steady breathing. Jensen thinks he’s full of shit, and that the thought of not turning book pages into paper airplanes and actually staring at their content bores Padalecki to death.

Tonight, however, seems to be different.

“What are you reading?” Jared asks, voice low, punctuated by a soft thud as he puts his phone down on the nightstand.

“ _Prisoners of geography,”_ Jensen answers mechanically.

It seems too loud in the motionless silence that had come before Jared’s question. It manages to pull Jensen out of the book’s subject, concentrate on his immediate surroundings. “Can’t sleep?” he asks, turning to look at Jared.

Jensen’s surprised to find his partner smiling faintly.

“No,” Padalecki shakes his head, looking at Jensen.

Jensen’s brain gets a little confused for a moment. It has happened since he met Padalecki. A certain kind of look, a certain tint in whiskey and dark green eyes…and Jensen’s surviving brain cells go out for a walk. Downwards. One could argue there’s no more _actual_ thinking involved.

God, how he misses the hair, haphazardly spread out on the pillow, how it sufficed to bend down, pull on Jared’s hair to expose his neck, and press his lips there, just below the ear to make Jared shiver, to start a trail that ended with arms thrown around each other, with sweat dripping on their foreheads, and that hair, again, that stupid ponytail he had when they met, perfectly tied, the strands that stuck to Jared’s forehead when they fucked, the fuel to Jensen to know he’s done that, messed everything up, and now it’s chaos, chaos that he’s tamed, perfection destroyed and put back together again.

“…you even listening to me, Ackles?”

Hard no on that one.

“What were you saying?”

Padalecki rolls his eyes. “Nothing.”

Jensen stares at him, book still open in his lap. “You know, it’d be so much easier if you took those _How to talk to people_ classes.”

And there it is, the shit-eating grin that lets Jensen know he’s helped Padalecki achieve what he always intended - annoy Jensen.

“Those are business talks, Ackles, and they’re not called that.”

“You could use any help in communicating.”

“You just want me to open up a business and be your sugar daddy.”

Jensen can’t refrain from bursting into a laugh. It’s nonsensical, and yet - Jared has the gift of lacing his tone with just enough sarcasm to make you think twice about whether he’s being serious. Jensen’s about to offer up a witty reply, but Padalecki speaks first, sudden and hurried.

“Read to me,” Jared says, sliding down from the sitting position on his back, sheets rustling as he kicks at the cover to smooth it out.

Jensen hesitates for a second. Is it a joke?

Or is it Jared, reaching out? Needing something after the day, after the group meeting - of which, of course, they have not talked about, that’ll take about four more runs and three days of Jensen prodding - but not knowing how to spell it out?

Jared smiles at Jensen. Big, a glint in his eyes that reveals what’s always been behind the Padalecki brand of crazy, uncertainty, questions that could be answered just by diving headfirst, no matter what’s on the other side.

So, yeah. He’s not joking.

It’s a game. A limit, stretched out.

But Jesus fuck, Jared’s picked an interesting moment to do it. It feels like now, the smallest moment could make the ice under them crack. The cold reality of all the things they haven’t said out loud is a threat looming over them, despite their best efforts to face it head-on.

There are still off-hand comments regarding Jensen’s decision to quit the team. Jensen still finds himself wanting to punch something frequently.

Progress - Jared’s comments are unintentional, without malice. Just extensions of who Jared was, _is_ , statements that simply don’t fit Jensen’s reality. And Jensen - that _something_ has ceased to be Padalecki.

“Fine,” Jensen finally agrees, a little unsure himself about what they’re doing. “But no complaints.”

“About the book?” Padalecki replies, putting his right hand under his head and a cold foot near Jensen’s right ankle.

“About anything.”

Jared opens his mouth to say something, decides against it, leaves Jensen with a mixed expression to decipher.

Definitely not a joke, Jensen realizes.

It’s Padalecki, volume of personality turned almost all the way down. Trying.

Silence that beckons the empty space to be filled with the simplest things.

Jensen reads.

~

There’s a scoreboard somewhere in the universe, and someone decides Jensen’s taken too much of a lead. Next day is considerably more difficult than _breakfast blowjob - fall asleep reading_ hour interval he’d previously experienced.

Beaver seems to be set on something - in particular, on not letting Jensen off easily. Jensen thought it’d be a few sessions for the army to have cover. Mandatory. Getting shot at, trauma, yadda-yadda. A signature and _go on, go forth and continue giving blood, sweat and tears to the country._

But no, Beaver seems intent to dredge up a lot of shit Jensen doesn’t want to think about, all the way back to his brother.

And here Jensen thought that childhood trauma was overpriced hacks’ area of expertise. Old man Beaver seemed more like the guy who’d throw you in the pool and stand on the side, watch the magic of figuring out on your own how not to drown - and possibly swim - rather than the one who’d ask you why you’ve always been afraid of water and hand you the Kleenex when you pull the sad story out of your sleeve.

“Tell me more about him.”

Jensen’s reply could be excused as being a knee-jerk reaction, except it takes him good seconds to come up with it.

“You should sign my papers, tell them I’m fit for duty.”

His brother has nothing to do with this.

“Can’t do that, Ackles.”

Yeah…Jensen calls bullshit. “Really.”

It’s calm, _too_ calm. Something between a question and a statement.

“Let me explain it to you like you’re five, Sergeant,” Beaver replies, amused rather than matching Jensen’s growing frustration. “You come in here, you tell me three sentences about your life, and have this expectation that we’re done.” Jensen’s protests are interrupted before they begin. “It’s like describing how a car looks like. You told me nothing about what’s under the hood, how fast it runs, how much can it take before it runs out of gas. Just how shiny the paint is.”

“Metaphorically.”

“However you want to take it. Ain’t the smartest analogy. Point is, you’re feeling all these things. Not just from recent events. Those are only the last drops in your bucket. You can’t bear going forward like you’ve been doing, keeping it all down. There’s no more guns. No more adrenaline. No more missions. It’s just you, and the choices you’ve made. And one way or another, they’re gonna come out. I’m just giving you a good space to do it.’”

The words cut deep, truth opening doors where only windows were cracked. The darkest of rooms, the most stubborn insistence that they don’t exist, that they’re not part of Sergeant Ackles’ identity.

Shit.

For all he’s angry at Padalecki for not being able to accept who he is now, Jensen’s not great at it, either. He just handles it differently. Less bloody hands, less screaming at recruits, more frustration that builds, shortness of temper, retreat. 

“It’s a powder keg,” Jensen says, digging his nails through his jeans, right above his knee, brief physical pain that spreads, absorbs the live current passing through him.

Beaver tilts his head forward. “Excuse me?”

“The bucket. It’s not…a _bucket._ ”

The therapist nods. “I see we’re continuing with the analogies.”

Great. He’s mocking Jensen.

“You started it.”

“Whatever floats your boat, Ackles,” Beaver replies, smiling. Then, sharp, making time feel compact, indistinct, “Now tell me about your brother. How it felt when he died.”

For the briefest moment, Jensen stops breathing. “Jesus, you aren’t pulling any punches today.”

“Eliciting a reaction from you is exactly what I want to be doing.”

Well, he’s doing a fantastic job at it. Jensen’s ready to either hit something or flee.

He shakes his head.

He wants to.

Run. Forget. Pretend like it’s not clawing at the edges of his mind every second, every minute, trying to pull Jensen under, in the abyss of grief and guilt.

But he can’t. Not really.

Of all the fucking things that could have made him stay, and speak, it’s _Padalecki_. The way he proves every day that going against your instinct is only a mistake in the battlefield. The absolutely terrifying things Jared faces instead of running for the hills.

It’s part wanting to be worthy, part _fuck it, if run-to-Antarctica Padalecki can do it,_ and part sheer exhaustion in carrying it for so long with him.

~

_When he gets the news, it_ _’s quick, clinical. Someone asks: “we have any casualties?” five feet away from Jensen, someone answers Ackles, dead on impact. There are more names, deaths and injuries, ones Jensen knows, distantly, names he never put a face to, and he never will._

_His commanding officer’s eyes travel from the messenger in front of him to Jensen, who’s leaning on the wonky metal table he’d been eating on, half risen from his seat. Jensen, immobile, incapable of moving, looks back at him._

_Olsson nods, and Jensen receives confirmation. Blue eyes lost in the green and khaki canvas convey compassion._

_It doesn’t matter. Jensen’s mind stops. Everything grinds to a halt - except there’s no fanfare, no shots sounding out, no explosions to merit the shock. Just…absence._

_He doesn’t know how he manages to get to his cot._

_The tent is empty, just the heat and the smell of dried sweat keep him company. The three other beds are perfectly made. It’s strange how Jensen focuses on this small detail. How the ragged blanket folds under the mattress without creases._

_The air around him becomes static, thick, dust tickling his nostrils. It doesn’t move, and neither does Jensen._

_He can’t breathe._

_He can’t fathom this moment. He doesn’t understand it._

_Everything is silent. Even his panic. He doesn’t say a thing. He doesn’t cry._

_He jumps into the abyss alone, scared, without a sound to show for it._

_~_

“Sergeant Ackles?”

Beaver’s voice brings Jensen to the present.

“I’m fine.”

He isn’t. But it’s now he becomes aware of it.

~

_The days pass by like they did until then, plus or minus a consoling hand on his shoulder. They get it. His friends, his fellow soldiers. Or so they say, that’s what Jensen’s to understand from it._

_But Jensen doesn’t._

_Jensen does his job, and in the spare moments, he tries to find his place in a world where his brother doesn’t exist. Existed. Lived. Jensen’s lost at sea, waves terrifying as they are persistent, and he’s lost his anchor, he’s lost sense of direction, he’s lost everything._

_He gets a letter from home._

_His mother has been committed to a psychiatric facility upon having a breakdown hearing the news._

_Jensen thinks that, if anything, they’re too late for it._

_The letter quickly becomes a memory, one more thing that happened, just like the seconds and minutes in his days, pieces of time molded into something familiar. In reality, they’re adrift from Jensen’s own reality, abstract concepts, much like Jensen with his own skin. He’s lost any sense of belonging._

_Maybe that’s why, even though he always feel like there’s not enough air to breathe, nothing ever happens, nothing ever pulls him out of the cruel dream._

_His body takes care of the mechanics. Jensen retreats into his own thoughts, a ghost made out of faults and memories._

_~_

“You felt alone,” Beaver says softly. Compassionate.

_The nerve on him_ , Jensen thinks.

He places a bomb in front of Jensen, lets it explode, then whispers to a broken, beaten Jensen, _How terrifying._ With pity.

Concern.

Jensen’s not sure the two are distinct.

“You drew, ” Beaver continues, reading the next item off his _what-Jensen-said_ checklist. “Why did you?”

“Excuse me?”

The therapist raises an eyebrow, unperturbed by Jensen’s hostility. “Well, you done it since then? Before that? What did you draw?”

“Jesus fucking Christ, how can that be important?” Jensen asks, exasperated, voice cracking. “It was just this thing, this…I don’t know, I started one night when I couldn’t sleep, it was a piece of paper and a pencil, and it made me not think.”

“You have any drawings left from that time?”

“Somewhere,” Jensen answers noncommittally.

In truth, that period is a little blurry. He’s not completely clear on how he finished his tour, how he spent the four months back home before the next one. Taking care of succession papers, final resting spots, memorials, bills, the family home - all he remembers is that when he landed back in a war zone, it was all gone. The bad things.

Buried, maybe.

Jensen had a clarity he’d not had before, determination, focus, skill. His brother became a hollow part of his being, a thought more than a feeling. The only thing Jensen could do to move forward was to pretend his brother never lived.

“Ackles,” Beaver pokes, again, and God, has this man not learned what is it with bears and prodding? “You talked half an hour last time about Padalecki not doing your dishes. How goddamn angry it made you that he was not listening. You telling me that this thing, the death of the only true carer you have ever known, didn’t affect you? That three words are all that’s necessary to describe it?”

Jensen clenches his fist.

“There are no words,” he throws out, red-hot fury coursing through him. Half directed at Beaver for making him feel this. Half at the world, at destiny, at whatever the fuck deity made Jensen live through what he did. “I can’t talk about it.”

“That’s fine. But feel it.”

Jensen’s answering laugh is derisory.

Beaver calls this session a breakthrough. Jensen prefers to think of it as shattering his sanity into a million little pieces.

~

“Jensen?”

Padalecki’s voice is far away. The fog in Jensen’s mind leaves nothing through completely. The clink of the keys, the thud of the front door as it closes.

Jacket comes off. Jared’s there. Why, he doesn’t know. He should be with his recruits. That’s the schedule, isn’t it?

No. Jeans.

Maybe this is a dream.

Maybe he just wishes Jared was there for him, that Jensen’s feelings were important for a few minutes.

Yes. That’s it.

The dream follows Jensen into the shower. Cold. Something hot on his cheeks. He finally punches something.

He slips. Slides. Gives in. Hands around him. Small, cockroach crushed under the weight of it.

_He should have died. Him. Jensen had no purpose. His brother did._

Water, dripping.

Desperation. Reaching to shield his weakness from the dream.

Whispers. Amber. Whiskey. Green. Tears, brimming.

The bed is soft. So different from the one he slept on then. When he found out, the first night.

And yet, it’s the same feeling.

Only now, there’s a warm hand on his cheek, a dip in the mattress where Padalecki sits.


End file.
